I Finally Find Birds

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It isn’t like I never liked birds, before. I just didn’t find them worth watching, unlike, say, a slowly developing flower bud. But things change. A madman is elected president and I take up bird watching. Perhaps the two are related.

What really started me looking at birds was this new window.

After over a dozen years in our little house we are finally fixing it up – literally fixing the bits that were falling apart, and also making the changes I’ve dreamed of making but never thought we’d get to. Like having an enormous bay window in an open airy main room. We still need to have dry wall and ceilings put in, but those are details. The important part is sitting in that rocking chair and looking out at the birds as the sun rises each morning.

We’ve gone through bag after bag of birdseed, and for the trouble we have fed a legion of starlings, a flurry of squirrels, and eight other species of birds that I know of – cardinals, blue jays, tufted titmice, house finches, sparrows, mourning doves, hairy woodpeckers, Carolina wrens. And one rat.

I’m not sure how to think about finding a love of bird watching from the comfort of my rocking chair. If I had found a love of ornithology and field biology I’d be a bit less embarrassed. But perhaps its just that older people know stuff that younger people don’t, like that sitting by a window staring out at little creatures with a cup of coffee by your elbow does something good to your brain. So I’m not going to fight it. If I become an eccentric old bird lady, so be it. I could do worse.